Matt Knew
by MsKRyan.ox
Summary: [Companion Piece to That Age Old Story] Matt knew that Raelynn and Kelly were in love, don't ask him how he knew, he just knew.


Knowing

 _Adjective: showing or suggesting that one has knowledge  
or awareness that is secret or known to only a few people_

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Matt knew.

He had always suspected it, but deep inside he always knew it. During the days that they shared that dinky little rundown apartment with the perpetually broken refrigerator that could barely fit two of them let alone all four, Matt knew. He didn't know how he knew, but he knew. They didn't even hide it all that well, in a way everybody at the academy and later even the firehouse saw it, but Matt – Matt knew. Not even Andy knew what Matt did and Andy had known them since their high school days. He just blew it off as Kelly being Kelly and Raelynn being Raelynn.

Not everybody saw the way that they would glance at each other when the other wasn't looking or the softness behind every single touch that they shared. Nobody saw that the way that they acted wasn't how 'just friends' acted. They wouldn't see the way that every time Kelly would unnecessarily risk his life, Raelynn would tear him a new hide more than she would for anybody else, even him or Andy. They didn't see the way that when the bad calls got to her, had her almost succumbing to tears on her worst days, Kelly would be the first one she would seek out. Kelly would do it too.

Matt knew.

During the days of Renee and Kyle the looks never stopped, the softness of the touches never lessened, the unsaid calls of help never went unanswered. Even when the fights got bad, when Raelynn and Kelly would leave at the end of their shifts angry to go home to their siginifcant others and upset with one another even if it was over something miniscule, Matt still knew. Matt saw it in the ways they would pick each other up off of the floor, or the ways that no matter the time of night sometimes even morning, one could always depend on the other to get their head back on straight. Still Andy never knew. Andy was so wrapped up in his own little world with Heather and the boys to see that his two friends were so head over heels for each other despite being with and supposedly in love with other people.

Matt knew.

He saw the momentary shock on Raelynn's face when she saw the ring for Renee. He saw that even though she was happy for Kelly and maybe even a tiny bit for Renee, the happiness never once reached her eyes. He heard it in the way that she practically begged him and Andy not to say anything to Kelly about the break up with Kyle – not to say anything about the ring that she had turned down or how she had gotten kicked out of the apartment that she had been sharing with her ex and was now living back at home with her parents. Matt could see it in the way that no matter the time of day, the distance that she had to drive, the promises she would need to make, she was the only one that could get Kelly back off the floor after Renee broke his heart.

He saw the anger in Kelly's eyes when he did finally find out about the break up with Kyle and how he had reacted when Raelynn had turned down the chance to become the Doctor's paramedic trophy wife. Matt saw the way that Kelly wanted to storm into Chicago Med and practically tear the doctor limb from limb just to put him back together again to tear him limb from limb once more. Never mind that it had been Raelynn that broke up with Kyle and had broken the doctor's heart.

No one was ever good enough for Raelynn or Kelly. He would hear that growls under Kelly's breath every time a doctor or a cop or anyone from the male species got too close to Raelynn for his liking. He could see the pursed lips and the green in her eyes every time Kelly would give another female any kind of flirtatious attention. He would see the shakes of the head, the silent 'seriously? this one?' looks that the pair would always end up sharing when they would eventually lock eyes as those nights out dragged on into the early hours of the morning.

Matt knew.

The injuries might have been the worst. If nobody had seen it before, they definitely saw it during the times that one of them or both was injured or sick. The feelings that the two shared for each other would come out in spades during those times. Kelly would treat Raelynn like she was some sort of porcelain doll and would never let her do anything for herself until finally she would end up losing it on him and start screaming and yelling and possibly even crying – Kelly never could handle her non-work related tears well. Raelynn would literally move in with him when he was injured, putting her personal life on hold until his body was back at one hundred percent and she wouldn't settle for anything less – some of the people in their lives would say that it was just Kelly taking advantage of her mother hen tendencies (of course, Matt knew it was more about taking advantage of Raelynn's uninterrupted attention for him) because he would never lose his temper with her like she did him.

The illnesses were just as bad because when one of them would get sick, it was like the end of the world had come. The other would go out of their way just to buy the chicken soup that the one who was sick wanted, even if it was a forty-five minute drive both ways just to get it. Cell phones were even handed over without argument just to make sure that sleep went uninterrupted. And when it was Raelynn on that couch, the Audrey Hepburn movies were always on the television even as she slept despite how much Kelly couldn't stand her movies. And even though it was inevitable that the other would fall sick after taking care of the one who originally caught the cold, they still always took care of each other.

Matt knew.

Matt saw it in the way that the only person who could get Kelly's head back on straight after Andy's death was Raelynn. Even when he and Kelly would just want to tear each other limb from limb, would go head to head in a war of words, would take cheap shots just to get under the other's skin it would be Raelynn that would get Kelly to back off, that would get to him go and cool down before he would say something that he would regret or act before he had a chance to think it through.

Matt would see it in the way that whenever you saw Raelynn, Kelly wasn't too far behind. One may have been walking on eggshells around Kelly, but Raelynn was fighting an inner battle that she masked with a smile or with her flair of professionalism. Kelly always made sure to keep her thoughts positive, always made sure to let her know that even though he may have been blaming Matt, he never once thought that it was Raelynn's fault for not getting their friend to Lakeshore fast enough.

Matt knew.

He would see it in the fear. The fear that they would have for each other and only for each other, whether it was a difficult call that could possibly end with Kelly losing his life or it was in the way that the doctors just couldn't get the internal bleeding to stop after the accident that had sent Raelynn flying from the back of Ambo 61 and onto the windshield of her Paramedic Field Officer's buggy car twenty feet away. It was in the way that Raelynn's hawk eyes would zero in on Kelly every single time that his arm would practically give out during his neck injury or the way she found out about Kelly's addiction to pain killers that almost had her walking out on him and their fifteen years of friendship.

It was in the way that Kelly wrapped his arms around Raelynn as they both struggled to watch part of her family home burn in a fire that had been purposefully set to target Kelly – that in a way had been set to target Raelynn as well because while Matt knew, everybody else always suspected that she was one of, if not the biggest, of Kelly's weaknesses.

For a glimpse of a moment, he saw it even when everything seemed to be going to hell in a hand basket at Chicago Med. The way that Kelly's eyes became shrouded with fear as the man not even standing three feet away from Raelynn pulled out a hand grenade and made to blow himself up, he continued to see the fear fade into determination as Kelly threw himself between the two pushing the woman he silently loved out of the way for even the slightest chance to keep her safe, to keep her alive even if it meant his own death.

He heard the fear in her voice that day even though Raelynn was threatening that she would strangle Will Halstead with his own stethoscope if he didn't give Kelly that chance to live. He saw the fear in her eyes at the mere thought of the man she silently loved being black tagged, being left to die from the injuries that he had received from saving her life.

Matt knew.

Even in the times when the anger would set in, Matt knew. Both of them could be blinded by their anger sometimes, so blind that even the love they had for one another could barely shine through, but Matt still saw it. They would live to argue with each other, live to yell, to let their feelings be known even if it may have been the kindergarten way of doing it. The fighting was always more passionate between the two of them than when they would fight with anybody else. The two of them always knew the buttons that needed to be pressed, the names that needed to be called and the memories that needed to be brought back up.

Matt knew.

Just like when they lost Andy, it was Raelynn that kept Kelly off the floor after they lost Shay. She would do everything in her power to keep him from drowning in his grief if she had too. She would drive out to the lake with him, pick him up from whatever bar he had decided to drown his sorrows in, would take the keys from him or use her professional status as a Paramedic Field Officer to make sure he got home safely when he would show up drunk for work. Even when he was driving her half mad, Raelynn always took care of Kelly during that time.

Kelly, in a way, made sure that Raelynn's thoughts never landed on the fact that she had been the one to give the order for Gabby and Shay to enter that building. Despite being at his lowest, he took care of her in his own little way by giving her something to worry about besides her roll in Shay's death.

Matt knew.

He saw it in the pain that they would unknowingly cause each other; the moments that they were on the cusp of quite possibly being something besides 'just friends,' but then this person or that person would come into the picture and either Raelynn or Kelly would take the same step back that they always did.

The pain that would reflect in Raelynn's eyes after Renee Royce came into Kelly's life. The way the happiness never reached her eyes when she saw how happy Royce would make Kelly despite everything else that was happening in his life at that time. How she had brought him this experimental surgery that could get him back on the job in just over a month in comparison to the surgery that would take six months to a year of rehab. He saw the way that the pain stayed on Raelynn's face at the mere thought of just seeing Kelly through Skype calls if he had decided to go through with joining Renee in Spain. Or when they were just about to become something once more and then here walks in Renee once again and she was having a baby that could have ended up being Kelly's. He saw the pain in Raelynn's eyes when Kelly had come back from Vegas married to someone he had known less than forty-eight hours.

He saw the pain in Kelly's eyes too when Raelynn's high school boyfriend came back into town to work at Chicago Med. He saw the way that every little smile that would come across Raelynn's face after a visit to the hospital would cause Kelly pain at the mere thought that her ex boyfriend had put it there. Even when she would say that they were 'just friends' Kelly's eyes would still fill with that same pain at the mere thought that maybe they weren't 'just friends' or maybe the next time someone had asked the two of them wouldn't be 'just friends' anymore and he would have missed his shot with her once more.

Matt knew.

It was in the teasing. The way they would joke around with one another when the arguing wasn't enough to satisfy this need to let their feelings show. The way that the playful names would be called and the way they would bump hips or share secret smiles as they teased each other mercilessly. Kelly would call Raelynn his little Chihuahua and she would call him an over grown frat boy with a need for adventure and they would become the same fifteen year olds that he never knew.

He would see the red cheeks that would flare at an old memory that the two shared or the way that only they could tease each other in the way that they craved. Girlfriends and Boyfriends, Ex-Fiancée's would always try, but would always fail because in their eyes it was never the same.

Matt knew.

He could see it in how they were comfortable with each other's families. Nobody ever made it pass Benny Severide – he was a stubborn, pain in the ass that would tell you it was his way or the highway when it came to whatever he wanted, but to him there was no better for his son than the woman who could hold her own against him like Raelynn. No one quite put Benny Severide in his place about his treatment of his son when it came to her, knowing just when and how to push the boundaries to get the old firefighter to see reason.

Her family was as old as Chicago itself, or at least that's what they say and Kelly – Kelly would be seen feeling right at home in that house at the top of the hill. When the snow would fill the grounds and the in-laws would come into town and the dresses and the suits would come out of the closet, no one had a standing invitation to join the Lowe's for their Christmas Eve Formal Family Dinners quite like Kelly did. He even had his own matching set of Christmas Morning pyjamas that he refused to wear despite the fact that he always ended up wearing them when he did join them to open presents the next morning.

Matt knew.

It was in the happy moments too. In the way that when it was calm and they were just being Kelly and Raelynn, they would find a way to show each other just how much they cared. Whether it was Raelynn droping herself onto Kelly's lap at the squad table despite there always being an extra chair just for her only a few feet away, especially when they were playing poker. Or it would be in the way that Kelly would always pick the pickles or blueberries off of Raelynn's plate at the diner they would go to after a long shift. It was the smiles that were shared over a drink at Molly's – the way that one or both of them would keep the laughs coming as long as they wanted to no matter how the hours seemed to trickle into the early morning or who would need to lean on who just to get into the cab home.

Matt knew.

The quiet moments were his favourite though. Matt knew simply by watching them in those moments when they would unintentionally intentionally lean towards one another at the table in the break room. The not so secret smiles that would be shared as an empty cup of coffee would be replaced with a full one or when an extra dish would appear despite the paperwork that was currently sitting in front of them. It was in the way that when they were sitting across from each other their feet would somehow always meet in the middle not caring if anybody thought that they were playing footsie.

He could see it in the way that they would just sit together with the radio in Kelly's or Raelynn's car blasting whatever song on the radio as loud as the speakers could take it. And if they were watching TV, somehow someway they would always end up either sitting next to each or with Raelynn's feet in Kelly's lap. He could see it in the shared glances when they thought nobody was looking. He saw it in the not so subtle nods to one another when they would need to disappear into their quarters to finish whatever paperwork that they had been putting off.

Matt knew.

Matt knew better than anybody that his two closest friends, the people that he had become friends with when he needed them the most, were completely and utterly in love with one another and they just couldn't and wouldn't say the words that so desperately needed to be said out loud.

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 **A/N: Okay, so this one much like the chapter for 'A Lasting Love' kind of came out of nowhere. I'm still fighting major writer's block, so hopefully this one isn't a complete one of, as I would like to add onto it.**

 **Hope you like it. Leave a review and it might help with the Writer's Block.**

 **xo**


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